Developing a sustainability-driven learning organization through expatriate knowledge transfer: the case of Haier

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to examine how expatriates’ knowledge can be adopted to transform the mental models at the subsidiary level and develop a sustainability-driven learning organization in the context of emerging multinational enterprises (EMNEs).

Design/methodology/approach

Through an inductive interpretive analysis of three Haier subsidiaries from developing countries, this study compares between old and new understandings of sustainability and examines how expatriates’ knowledge can facilitate shifts toward the new to foster a sustainability-driven learning organization.

Findings

The authors find that subsidiary employees face strategic and operational ambiguity concerning sustainability issues and that a mix of dissemination and reinforcement routines that align with headquarters’ expectations are used to maintain a continuous sustainability-driven learning pattern. Though EMNE subsidiaries may have contrasting understandings of sustainability, expatriate knowledge transfer can help change subsidiaries’ mental models and thus create sustainable capabilities and mindsets that form a sustainability-driven learning organization at the subsidiary level.

Originality/value

This study reveals the potential in applying expatriate knowledge transfer to transforming sustainable mental models in building sustainability-driven learning organizations.

Citation

Sun, Y. and Hong, J. (2022), "Developing a sustainability-driven learning organization through expatriate knowledge transfer: the case of Haier", The Learning Organization, Vol. 29 No. 5, pp. 485-505. https://doi.org/10.1108/TLO-01-2022-0010